Apple To Acquire Beats Electronics

For those living under a rock, Apple has once again made headlines as it plans to acquire current pop culture staple, Beats Electronics. According to Apple and multiple news outlets, the deal is set to be worth $3.2 billion. Apple isn’t the first popular brand to make such a lofty acquisition recently, as Facebook purchased messaging app, WhatsApp, for $19 billion and Oculus VR for $2 billion. Google has also pulled out the wallet and bought Nest for $3.2 billion– certainly, none of these deals have broken the backs of either company.

Many different conjectures have been published as to why Apple has selected Beats Electronics to be aligned with the brand. Some believe its because of Apple’s desire to hire Beats’ co-founder Jimmy Iovine, who is apparently a leading innovator within the music industry; others think its for the newly released Beats streaming service, which has utterly failed to compete against Spotify; and then there are those who simply believe Apple is floundering, running out of the creative ideas consumers have come to expect from the powerhouse tech corporation. This final theory may hold some weight considering the fact that Apple has followed the pattern of the other aforementioned corporations’ acquisitions.

Personally, I believe Apple made this move because (A) it places another product that has huge profit margins in Apple’s current lineup, and (B) perhaps for revitalizing/merging iTunes Radio with Beats’ streaming service. Whatever theory you believe, its definitely not the groundbreaking move that will recover some of Apple’s lost market-share to other technology companies. Maybe Apple has some ‘holy-shit’ idea up their sleeve that we don’t know about, but until then let’s just think of this as two iconic brands getting in bed together– a la Jay Z and Beyoncé.

As for producer/rapper, Dr. Dre, he can now be regarded as hip hop’s wealthiest mogul, surpassing Jay Z and P Diddy. Although people speculated that he would be the first billionaire out of the triumvirate, Forbes estimates that this deal will bring in about $480 million after taxes– leaving Dre $200 million shy of the illustrious billion dollar mark. Regardless, I can’t imagine seeing a Dr. Dre album releasing any time soon, especially after this huge pay-day.